The discussion below is merely provided for general background information and is not intended to be used as an aid in determining the scope of the claimed subject matter.
Aspects of the invention relate to a sunshade assembly comprising a flexible sunscreen having opposed longitudinal edges and opposed transversal edges, a rotatable winding shaft configured for winding and unwinding the sunscreen at a first transversal edge and an operating beam connected to the second, leading one of said transversal edges, and two opposed longitudinal guides each defining a guide channel for receiving therein and guiding inwardly folded parts of corresponding ones of said longitudinal edges of the sunscreen, wherein the guides further each define an inwardly directed, longitudinally extending entrance opening for the respective guide channel and wherein the operating beam at opposite ends is provided with positioning members around which inwardly folded wings of the longitudinal edges of the sunscreen are positioned which define leading parts of the respective inwardly folded parts of the sunscreen, which positioning members extend from the operating beam into corresponding ones of said longitudinal guides and are movable with the operating beam for again positioning the longitudinal edges of the sunscreen into the longitudinal guides after coming out of said guides.
Although the provision of the positioning members (also sometimes referred to as “pilots”) allows to reposition the longitudinal edges of the sunscreen into the longitudinal guides of the sunshade assembly after coming out of said guides, one of the primary goals to be achieved when designing such a sunshade assembly is that the longitudinal edges of the sunscreen remain in the longitudinal guides as much as possible under normal operational conditions notwithstanding forces acting on the sunscreen. One manner for achieving this goal is to make the entrance opening as small as possible. The smaller such an entrance opening, the larger generally the force required for making the longitudinal edges of the sunscreen to come out of the guides. However, the combined thickness of a positioning member with wing folded around it (in fact the combined thickness of the positioning member and sunscreen) which has to pass through the entrance opening does not allow to make the entrance opening as small as desired.